


Forfeit to the Crown

by devilinthedetails



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: F/M, Fairness, Family, Favoritism, Forgiveness, Friendship, Gen, Hope, Justice, Mercy - Freeform, Misjudgment, Politics, Port Legann, Reconciliation, Treason, misinterpretation, parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-07-01
Packaged: 2019-11-08 19:20:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17987117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: On a visit to Legann, Roald and Shinko discover what treasons abound in the port city.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is yet another multi-chapter Roald story because I can never get enough Roald. My schedule is a bit hectic right now but I will try to post updates as regularly as possible. Feedback, of course, is always welcome and gives me the encouragement to keep writing a longer story like this:)

The Perils of Favoritism 

“Are we here at last then?” Lianokami asked, laying aside the embroidery she had been pretending to work on throughout their journey and peering hopefully out of the carriage as they rolled into Legann castle’s courtyard. 

“A proper lady never complains about the length or difficulty of a journey, Your Highness.” Lady Haname, Lianokami’s governess, shot her a stern glance as she neatly tucked away the embroidery she had been creating diligently ever since they had left the castle where Roald was governor. She had, Roald noticed, only ceased embroidering when they stopped to spend nights at roadside inns. Then she would being drilling Lianokami on perfect table manners never mind that the clientele of inn common rooms was rarely particularly genteel. A princess in Lady Haname’s considered opinion was expected to be the eternal embodiment of graciousness regardless of the company that surrounded her. 

“I wasn’t complaining, Lady Haname. I was asking a question.” Lianokami sounded impatient for an answer to her question. “I would appreciate an answer to it.” 

“A princess is always patient, darling,” Shinko murmured to their daughter, soft as wind whispering in willows. “She is forever poised whether she is awaiting an answer or an arrival at a destination.” 

The carriage halted, and a pair of bowing footmen in Legann colors hastened to open the door. Roald stepped down to the courtyard before extending an arm to assist Shinko out of the carriage. Once she was secure and smiling on the ground, Roald reached back to help his daughter and Lady Haname down in the same fashion. 

“Lord Imrah. Lady Marielle.” Roald nodded to the bowing Lord Imrah and his curtsying wife. “A pleasure to see you both again.” 

“Your Highnesses are most welcome to Legann.” Lord Imrah rose out of his bow with the warm expression in his hawk eyes that had always made Roald feel at home in Legann even when he was a newly arrived squire in the temperamental throes of adolescence. 

“You make us feel most welcome, my lord,” Shinko assured Lord Imrah with a polite incline of her head as he bent to kiss her fingers.

“We are honored to have you.” Lady Marielle’s gaze sparkled like the ocean in radiant sunlight as Roald took her silk-gloved hand to lift her out of her curtsy. 

“It’s an honor to be here, my lady.” Roald favored her with a smile.

A movement by one of the pillars that surrounded the staircase climbing up to entrance hall glimpsed through the corner of his eye captured Roald’s attention. A somehow familiar female figure, sunk into a curtsy, was tugging at the wrist of a man with a long, thin nose that reminded Roald of a bird’s beak. 

“Bow, you stupid crow man.” The sharp hiss the female figure directed to her companion as Roald approached told him that she was indeed who Roald believed her to be. She had, after all, inherited her mother’s tongue. 

“Alianne.” Roald rose her out of her curtsy as Shinko slid silently beside him. “It’s been too long since I saw you.” 

“Apparently so long you’ve forgotten I prefer to be known as Aly.” Aly’s tone was tart, and her lips pursed. 

“Aly,” Roald corrected himself, casting a curious glance at her companion. “May I ask who is the charming man beside you?” 

“He’s not charming.” With a laugh, Aly tossed back her strawberry-blonde hair, and Roald remembered the giggling girl she had once been as she ran around Pirate’s Swoop, creating havoc with her twin on his childhood visits to her family’s castle. “He’s my husband, Nawat Crow, named for the fact that he was once a crow.” 

“Once a crow?” echoed Shinko in respectful bafflement, an appraising expression fixed on Nawat Crow. 

“The Trickster gave me the ability to shift form, and I chose to be a man.” Nawat spoke as if his answer were the most natural and understandable one in the world rather than an account of bizarre, almost incomprehensible magic that demanded further explication. “You must forgive me if I forget to bow when I should. The manners of men and crows are different. Both involve ruffled feathers, but men don’t feed insects to each other as crows do.” 

Before Shinko could respond to this strange statement, Lady Marielle slipped into the conversation with a smooth suggestion. “Perhaps we might join the children in the nursery.” 

Roald blinked as Lady Marielle’s comment made him suddenly aware that his daughter had been dragged off to the nursery by Lord Imrah’s grandchildren, the sons and daughter of Lord Imrah’s oldest son who had been killed after the siege around the City of the Gods was broken just when everyone was hoping that the war with Scanra might finally be ending. Lady Haname, doubtlessly determined to protect her princess from any potential threat, had obviously accompanied her as she was nowhere to be seen in the courtyard or on the staircase to the entrance hall. 

“That’s a lovely idea, Lady Marielle.” Shinko linked her arm through that of her hostess and allowed herself to be guided up the steps and into the entrance hall on a path that would bring her to the nursery. 

“Our nestlings will be in the nursery as well.” Nawat hooked Aly’s elbow through his own and the two trailed behind Shinko and Lady Marielle to the nursery. 

“What is Aly doing in Legann, my lord?” Roald furrowed his forehead at his former knightmaster as soon as Aly had passed out of earshot with her husband. 

“She keeps a weathered eye on what foul mischiefs may be afoot in Legann for me, Your Highness.” Lord Imrah’s reply drew a faint scowl from Roald at the implication that Aly was still engaged in the spying that had led her to commit what could be regarded as treason against Tortall without any need for squinting. 

“My father would never approve.” Roald felt his jaw tighten with disapproval at his former knightmaster’s kindess that could border on indulgence of his favorites. “Her head only remains on her neck because she is my father’s godschild, the daughter of two of his oldest and must trusted friends.” The fact that Aly who had spied for an enemy of the realm was still alive was a persistent testimony to the perils of favoritism, Roald thought. 

“Your father cannot be seen to favor her.” Lord Imrah lowered his voice though they were alone on the steps of his castle. “Yet he would want no harm to befall her. I ensure that no harm befalls her, and she returns the service for my family and all of Tortall.” 

“You favor her as does my father.” Roald sighed and shook his head. “Yet there can be perils to favoritism, my lord.” 

“There can be perils but also perks.” Lord Imrah rested a hand on Roald’s shoulder as he had times beyond counting when Roald was his squire. “It might take someone who could be considered a traitor to root out certain types of treason, after all.” “You suspect treason in Port Legann?” Roald couldn’t restrain himself from gaping at Lord Imrah even if he knew it was uncouth as chewing with his mouth open. 

“I save those suspicions for Aly but I try to never let myself be surprised by any of the plotting in Port Legann. You may ask more questions of Aly at dinner, and she’ll give betters answers than I can.” Lord Imrah tilted his chin toward the doorway into the entrance hall. “Shall we go up to the nursery? Your daughter must have found some fascinating toys to show you by now.” 

Still brooding over Lord Imrah’s allusion to treason, Roald permitted himself to be coaxed upstairs to the nursery where his frown faded at the sight of his daughter darting up to as if to transform his former knightmaster’s prediction into reality. 

“This is the latest doll from Maren,” a beaming Lianokami informed him as he knelt before her so their eyes were at the same level. She waved a squat wooden doll painted with a bright dress in a rainbow of colors. “You can take the dolls apart to reveal smaller and smaller versions of it. It’s spectacular, Da. May I have one?” 

“For Midwinter if you’re good as gold.” Roald tweaked her nose in a teasing gesture that often made her grin but now only produced a pleading pout. 

“Midwinter is so far away, Da,” she pointed out. 

“Not if you keep the Midwinter spirit alive in your heart, my dear.” Roald tapped her chest with a gentle finger before spinning her around to encourage her to play with the other six children crowding the nursery. “Go run around with the other children now. Time flies when you’re having fun.” 

“You spoil her,” Shinko chided him. “That’s why she pouts and pleads so. A proper Yamani princess would never dare to conduct herself so improperly.” 

If Shinko thought he was too soft with Lianokami’s discipline, Nawat seemed to judge him as too harsh. 

“I don’t know how you can refuse your precious daughter anything.” Nawat’s gaze was riveted on his own small daughter but Roald’s spine stiffened as if the man who had once been a crow had accused him of some terrible abuse of his only child. “I could never refuse my darling Ochobai anything. She’s my favorite, you see.” 

“Parents shouldn’t have favorites.” Roald was appalled that Nawat would blatantly express such favoritism where his children could overhear. Such favoritism could hurt all of Nawat and Aly’s children, both his favored daughter and unfavored sons. He couldn’t recall ever hearing similar words from his own parents though he had long suspected that his mother and father each had their own favorites that didn’t include him, their too-stiff firstborn. There were differences between suspicions and certainties that could shape sibling rivalries and resentments, he believed in his bones. Parents could be forgiven for having feelings but never for biased actions and words. Feelings could not be controlled, but words and actions could. Control was the line that separated the pardonable from the unpardonable.“If they do, they shouldn’t show it by word or deed. They should strive to be as fair as possible.” 

“Lie to my children?” Nawat seemed stunned as if Roald had slapped him across the face. 

“Don’t lie.” Roald forced a patience he didn’t feel for this socially inept former crow into his voice. “Just be less open in your favoritism.” 

“Crows are open as the skies.” Nawat sounded as offended as if Roald had asked him to change his nature. “Men should be too.” 

“I won’t advise you on how to raise your children.” Offering a compromise, Roald sought to disengage from this disconcerting discussion. “I hope you will return the courtesy.” 

“I will.” Nawat was pulling at his shirt as if uncomfortable in the fine fabric, and Roald was overcome by the mental image of a crow grooming itself. “I’m still learning how men raise their nestlings. I can’t offer advice to those who weren’t crows.”


	2. Hollow Consolations

Hollow Consolations

“Aly.” Roald was pleased with himself for remembering Aly’s preferred form of address. It was evening in Legann’s elegant dining hall, and he, Shinko, Nawat, and Aly were feasting with Lord Imrah and Lady Marielle on one of Roald’s favorite Legann delicacies, poached trout soaked in a green mint-parsley sauce created with herbs imported from the Copper Isles, a dish he suspected Lady Marielle had ordered the kitchen to make in his honor. Lady Haname was presiding over the supper Lianokami was sharing with the rest of the children in Legann’s overflowing nursery, ensuring that the princess practiced perfect manners. “Lord Imrah mentioned suspected treasons you were monitoring in Port Legann.” 

“Some merchants don’t appreciate the prohibitions your father has imposed on trade with Scanra.” Aly’s lips curled “Prohibiting trade with Scanra isn’t profitable.” 

“Prohibiting trade with Scanra isn’t meant to be profitable.” Roald’s fingers clenched on his knife until his knuckles shone ivory. “It’s designed to bring the Scanrans to their knees at the negotiation table by denying them key trade and vital supplies.” 

“The Scanrans will pay for those vital supplies in chests of gold and jewels.” Aly flicked her hair as if to express that greed made treachery inevitable. “It’s profitable for more than just pirates to smuggle goods to the Scanrans.” 

“For some of our merchants, their first allegiance will always be to their profit margins rather than their country.” Lady Marielle’s smile was bitter as vinegar. 

“The war with Scanra in the far north can feel so distant to those merchants here in the south who haven’t lost sons to the fight against the Scanrans.” Lord Imrah’s gaze was iron-hard with grief for his firstborn son. 

“I’m sorry for your loss, my lord.” Roald ducked his head at the allusion to the son Lord Imrah and Lady Marielle had lost so recently it had to hurt like a raw, never healing wound. “The realm honors your son’s sacrifice.” 

His words, uttered sincerely, were the proper ones for a prince to offer when facing parents who had lost a son in service to the kingdom, yet he felt they were somehow shamefully inadequate since they were powerless to raise the dead or heal the living. 

“He died doing his duty to the kingdom. There can be no greater honor than that, Your Highness.” Lord Imrah’s firm tone rang oddly hollow in Roald’s ears as if duty and honor—the foundations of all their lives—were pitiful consolations for a lost son. “Traitors spit on his sacrifice, and the sacrifice of every faithful soldier who has ever marched bravely into battle for Tortall. That is why they must be caught and punished before their treachery can take root and produce rotten fruit.” 

“Traitors shouldn’t be born.” Nawat speared a piece of trout with the air of a bird of prey pounding on a vulnerable field mouse. “They should be culled from the flock before they leave their eggs. That’s what crows would do—sense the wrongness and kill the traitors before they could hatch.” 

“I’ve explained before that people don’t cull their children.” Aly’s head shake was as fond as it was frustrated. “The traitors have hatched, Nawat.” 

“Then they must be thrown from the nest before they can destroy it.” Nawat grinned, front teeth flashing like the fangs of a mythical monster. “They must not be allowed to attack the flock with their beaks and talons.” 

“I have to uncover the bad birds before they can be thrown from the nest,” Aly told him, sipping on her Tyran wine as if to wash the terrible taste of treason from her mouth. 

“When you find these traitors, their lives and properties will, of course, be forfeit to the Crown.” Shinko spoke for the first time since they began discussing treason, and Roald marveled that she could make the grim verdict sound so simple when to him it was never so straightforward.


	3. Scrying Questions

Scrying Questions

“Merchant Berger and his wife were caught sending coded trade letters to the Scanrans.” Aly presented letters—doubtlessly intercepted from the manacled couple behind her—to Roald. Frowning, he took them, and, reading swiftly through them, saw they were records of midnight transactions that described covert locations to exchange contraband goods as well as the exorbitant prices required to receive such valuable items in secrecy under cloak of darkness. 

He handed them to his wife to study as Aly went on, pinching at Merchant Berger’s earlobe, “So far they’ve refused to talk to me, but I’m certain if I follow dear old Da’s example of cutting off their ears for my necklace, they’ll become much more chatty.” 

“If you cut off our ears, we won’t be able to hear your questions to answer them.” The merchant’s chin trembled, but his words were defiant. 

“I’d only cut off one ear from each of you.” Aly progressed from pinching to yanking on Merchant Berger’s earlobe. “That would get you talking fast enough.” 

A gasp—sharp but soon stifled—echoed throughout the room but it didn’t come from Merchant Berger or his wife. Instead it originated from a girl pale as milk curds who could have been no more than ten hidden in the shadows behind the couple that must have been her parents. 

“Who is that?” Shinko’s imperious hand wave made it apparent that her focus had fallen on the same slight figure as Roald’s. 

“Their daughter Elaine.” Aly’s smirk reminded Roald of a cat torturing a captured mouse. “She’s their only child. I sense she will be a useful pawn when I question them.” 

“No one is to question them until I speak to my father.” Roald was as irked by Aly’s flippancy in this matter of life and death as he was suddenly determined to protect the girl Aly had hauled before him. Her parents might be traitors but she was an innocent, and justice, to him, demanded that she be treated as such. Addressing the guards that stood at attention throughout the room, he commanded, “Lock Merchant Berger and his wife in the dungeons. Put their daughter in a spare bedchamber. Place a guard outside the door but see that she is fed and comfortable.” 

Once the guards in Legann colors had stepped forward to obey, taking the merchant family away, Roald nodded tersely at Aly. “Her Highness and I must speak with my father. Please excuse us.” 

In a breach of propriety, he didn’t wait for a response. He slipped an elbow through Shinko’s and hurried them up to the ramparts, where he hoped the air would be unclouded enough to allow him to scry with his father in Corus. 

Attuned to his needs as ever, Shinko silently withdrew a tiny mirror from her pocket. Inclining his head in gratitude, he accepted it from her and stared into the glass that shone almost blindingly in the bright sun reflected off the Emerald Ocean, willing his magic to reach out and touch his father hundreds of leagues away. 

When he felt his father’s magic brush inquiringly against his, he sent an image—more powerful than words—of the situation and the treason he was confronted with across their bond and the space between them. He believed the mere fact that he was reaching out to his father in such a fashion should have made it obvious to even the most obtuse and distant parent that he was seeking guidance on how to proceed, but Papa replied only with a firm statement that he had to deal with the situation—that he was entrusted with the authority of the Crown to do so as he had been in the past—before severing the connection between them before Roald could ask for further advice. 

Weak-kneed, he wished that he was strong enough to justify his father’s unshakeable faith in him but he had always been water rather than stone, and he could feel himself breaking like the waves smashing against the cliffs beneath Legann castle. 

The salty wind off the ocean tore at his face and clothing, making him aware of the fact that he was sweating and shaking like a dog in heat. 

“What did your honored father say?” Shinko squeezed his hand that continued to shiver in her grasp. 

“He trusts me to deal with the situation, wielding the full authority of the Crown.” Roald’s throat was sand dry. He needed water as he so often did after working a strong spell. His Gift wasn’t as powerful as his father’s. Papa could commune with thousands of Bazhir every day at sunset without suffering splitting headaches while Roald was tempted to cut off his head with his own sword to spare himself the lightning flashes of agony ripping constantly from one temple to another, exacting a terrible toll for the magical cost of his scrying. It almost would have been better to have no Gift, he thought, then deal with these wretched headaches whenever he strained the boundaries of his magical abilities…

“Of course he does, my love.” Shinko’s head curled into the curve of his shoulder, and he wished he could smile at the feeling of them sliding together like two puzzle pieces created by the gods to fit inside one another. “You’ve handled a situation of treason well before.” 

“I don’t know how to handle this situation.” Roald’s headache only increased as he remembered that it was his responsibility—entrusted to him by his father— to stamp out the treason in Legann. He needed to be able to think calmly about how to best proceed against the treason Aly had discovered but the pain tearing through his head made thought impossible and calm as unattainable as grasping a cloud in the sky overhead. 

“You need food and rest.” Shinko kissed his throbbing temples tenderly. “Then you’ll be able to think about what to do.” 

“I’m not hungry, my dear.” The mere mention of food made him worry he would vomit, but the idea of rest was sufficiently appealing that he allowed Shinko to coax him down the stairs to the corridor that lead to the chambers Lord Imrah and Lady Marielle had assigned to them throughout their visit. 

“You will be once you’re presented with food.” Shinko’s eyes crinkled at him whether in concern or playfulness, he couldn’t be certain. “After working a great magic, you always declare that you aren’t hungry. Then when food is placed before you, you become ravenous, and all the food disappears in an eye blink. It is a very powerful vanishing magic indeed.” 

“You mock me.” Roald shook his head with the realization that the crinkling around his wife’s eyes had indeed meant she was having fun at his expense. Almost instantly, he regretted shaking his head when his dizzying body protested even this minor motion. 

“Nonsense.” Shinko steered him into their parlor, guiding him into the soothing softness of a sofa. “I care for you as nobody else does.” 

Before Roald could muster the wit required for a reply, Shinko addressed a maid Lady Marielle had assigned to their service who had faded against the wall tapestries upon their entry, “Please bring some soup and bread from the kitchens for my husband.” 

“At once, Your Highness.” The maid swept a deep curtsy before racing off to the kitchens to return with the soup and bread Shinko had ordered. 

“You’ll eat to restore your strength, darling.” Shinko cupped Roald’s cheeks between her palms as soon as the maid left them alone together. “Then we’ll discuss how you are to proceed in this matter of treason.” 

“Your wish is my command.” Roald relaxed into her hands, thinking nothing was as comforting as his wife’s loving touch. 

Soon the maid came back bearing a bowl of chicken soup. Accepting the bowl from the outstretched hands of the curtsying maid, Roald inhaled the steam—scented with cinnamon, cloves, and ginger—wafting from the soup and began to feel his headache evaporating at the smell of these strong, healing spices. Shinko, it turned out, had known his needs better than he had.


	4. Misinterpretations and Misjudgments

Misinterpretations and Misjudgments

“We have to persuade the Berger couple to talk so we can discover how deeply these treacherous trades with Scanra run in Port Legann.” Roald finished spooning up the last of the spiced chicken soup the maidservant had brought him, set it aside on the small table in front of the couch, and picked up a plate with a buttered roll that had been waiting for him on the same table. “It could be to our advantage that we have their daughter.” 

“I thought you were opposed to harming the girl.” Shinko cocked her head at him, studying him as if he were a new sight to her. 

“I am.” Roald bit through the crisp crust of the roll to the cheese and herbs baked into the warm, soft center. “However, I’m not opposed to using her as a bargaining chip with her parents.” 

“I’m not certain how much bargaining can be done with traitors, my dear.” Shinko’s tone was the delicate one she always adopted whenever she felt she had to say anything that might contradict his wishes or will. “The lives and properties of those who betray the Crown are forfeit to the Crown. The law is crystal clear on that.” 

“The merchant and his wife must die.” Roald had accepted the justice of that sentence. “You know it, I know it, and so must they. They’re locked in the dungeon and beyond thinking about their own fates, they must be worried about their daughter’s future.” 

“They should have thought of their daughter’s future before they entangled themselves in treason.” Shinko’s face was a blank slate Roald couldn’t read, and he wondered if she was remembering how her parents’ political ambitions had left her and her brother outcast orphans in the cutthroat Yamani court. “Children always pay the price when their parents overreach.” 

“The merchant and his wife, in their misguided way, might have been trying to secure their daughter’s future.” Roald was reluctant to ascribe entirely evil motives to even those who had committed the vilest crime of treason. Merchant Berger and his wife might have been selfish and greedy but he believed they must have loved their daughter and been convinced they were providing a bright future for her with the rich profits of their illegal trading with Scanra. 

“It’s ironic then that their efforts to secure her future will end up robbing her of it.” Shinko’s voice remained as expressionless as her face. “The girl will be penniless on the streets of Port Legann.” 

“She doesn’t have to be if her parents cooperate with our investigation.” Roald lifted a hand to forestall the objection he sensed Shinko was about to raise. “The Crown will claim all that belongs to the Berger couple, of course, but the Crown might hold those possessions in custody for their daughter, a ward who would be entrusted to the Crown’s care and authority.” 

“I see how that arrangement benefits the disgraced Berger family.” A faint crinkle of confusion appeared in Shinko’s forehead—the first flicker of feeling she had displaying during this discussion. “I fail to see how this profits the Crown, however.” 

“Wards have long-term value, my love,” Roald explained, passion beginning to imbue him. “They can be raised to be faithful to the Crown, and, when they come of age, the Crown can make good marriages for them that advance the Crown’s interests.” 

“I think you’re only saying that to justify your compassion.” The furrow grew between Shinko’s eyebrows. 

“You say that as if compassion is of no value in itself.” Roald tried to kiss the wrinkle out of his wife’s forehead. 

“It often isn’t in politics.” Shinko sighed, and Roald could feel how inadequate his attempt to kiss the tension out of her had been. 

“I’m not worried about politics.” Roald responded to her sigh with one of his own. “I’m worried about justice, and compassion is always of value in justice. Justice without compassion would be terrible as vengeance, darling.” 

Shinko opened her mouth to speak but before she could do so a nervous knock that seemed an apology for interrupting sounded from the door. 

“Come in!” Roald raised his voice just loudly enough to be heard through the door. He didn’t want the nervous knocker to feel reproached. 

A message boy in Legann livery appeared in the open doorway. Words tumbled from him, rushed as his bow. “The Lady Aly requests the favor of Prince Roald’s company in Lord Imrah’s study to discuss the guests in the dungeon soon as His Highness finds it convenient.” 

“Please assure Lady Aly I will be along presently.” Roald slipped his fingers into his purse to withdraw several coins, which he deposited in the palm of the wide-eyed message boy. “Thank you.” 

“Your Highness is very generous.” The coins vanished into the boy’s pocket as he bowed and then hurried down the hallway to deliver Roald’s reply. 

“I doubt Aly will be pleased by your compassion,” Shinko commented. 

“Thank you for the warning.” Roald stood and strode for the door, deciding that it would be wiser to bite his tongue around his wry observation that he knew that because he wasn’t half as foolish as she made him out to be. That would only rub raw against the friction that had suddenly started to chafe between them during their discussion of how to deal with the traitorous merchant family. He would have enough rough edges to smooth over in his relationship with Shinko that he didn’t have to carve more of them with snide remarks that would only amuse himself, not her. 

He stepped into Lord Imrah’s study, closing the door behind him, and realized with a jolt that it hadn’t changed much since he was a squire. Chiding himself for having expected it to change in a mirror of his own growth since his days as a squire, he settled into the chair across the desk from Aly. 

“You undermined my authority with the merchant couple today.” Aly opened the conversation with an attack, and wearily Roald contemplated if she was aiming to unbalance him. 

“I couldn’t allow you to torture them and certainly not their innocent daughter.” Roald’s chin lifted to indicate he had no intention of yielding on this decision. 

“Do you honestly believe I would have tortured them?” Aly arched an eyebrow. 

Roald stared into her eyes and saw the same determination—the same ruthlessness—that had made her mother King’s Champion and her father King of Thieves on the unforgiving Lower City streets of Corus. “I believe that you take after your parents, and that there is nothing you wouldn’t do to achieve your goals.” 

“I wouldn’t torture anyone.” Aly flicked her hair away from her face. “It’s not merely unethical. It’s ineffectual because people lie under torture—saying what they believe their tormentors want to hear—all the time. That’s why it’s useful that there are other, more refined ways to get people to not only talk but tell the truth when they do.” 

“What way did you have in mind then?” Roald asked, considering her carefully. 

“This.” Aly placed a glass vial on Lord Imrah’s desk. “Do you know what this is, Your Highness?” 

“It’s truthdrops.” Roald lifted the glass vial to inspect it closely and gasped as he identified the contents. “It has the power to force people to tell the truth. That’s why each drop is more precious than gold.” 

“Very good.” Aly assumed the mock-approving tone of a tutor as Roald returned the vial to the desk. Jerking her chin at it, she went on, “That’s what I intend to use instead of torture when I question our captured merchant couple. With your permission, of course.” 

“Granted on the condition that you answer one question for me.” Roald had to ask the question that was burning his tongue. “Why did you act as though you would torture our prisoners if you weren’t going to do so?” 

“I had to test which Legann guards could be relied on to keep quiet before I had them protect me while I questioned our merchant couple.” Aly gave him her most infuriating smirk. “To test how much they talk, I had to give them something to talk about such as a threat of torture. When I see who doesn’t gossip about my threat, I’ll know who to trust to guard me while I question our traitors.” 

“What if I hadn’t intervened?” Roald frowned. “Then you would’ve had to torture them or risk seeming weak.” 

“That’s more than one question.” Aly’s eyes twinkled at him but she offered an answer anyway. “I knew you would intervene. You’re too concerned with justice and mercy to not intervene when an innocent little girl is threatened regardless of how guilty her parents might be. People as committed to justice and mercy as you are very predictable, believe me.” 

“I misjudged you.” Roald flushed as he realized how unfair he had been to Aly in mistrusting her motives and misinterpreting her actions since he had arrived in Legann. “I misinterpreted your behaviors and motivations. I apologize.” 

“I don’t need your apologies.” Brusque as her mother, Aly shook her head. “I need to have your trust the way I have Lord Imrah’s so I can serve you according to my talents and experience as my mother serves your father. Do I have your trust?” 

Roald gazed at her, seeing not the little girl he had played with the nursery during his childhood visits to Pirate’s Swoop but the wily woman who had organized a spy ring and a rebellion that had destroyed a dynasty in the Cooper Isles. 

“You have my trust, and I’m honored to have your service.” He felt his throat tighten and had to clear it before he could continue. “Use the truthdrops to question Merchant Berger and his wife however you deem best, but tell them as well that if they cooperate with you, the Crown is prepared to make their daughter a ward.” 

“I thought you might be interested in making their daughter a ward of the Crown. That’s why I had her brought here.” Aly spoke smugly. “As I said earlier, people who are committed to justice and mercy are very predictable.” 

“I see you didn’t misjudge and misinterpret me as I did you.” Roald couldn’t contain a slight, grim grin. 

“Many people misjudge and misinterpret me.” Aly’s white teeth flashed at him in a crooked smile no doubt inherited from her father. “It’s a natural consequence of my preference for being enigmatic, I’m afraid.”


	5. Returned Loyalty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm truly sorry that this chapter wasn't posted sooner. I was busy with finals and then lacked inspiration for awhile due to my dog dying, but hopefully I'll be back on track after this chapter. I will try my best to have quicker updates for the remainder of the story. I understand if I have lost readers during this delay.

Returned Loyalty

Through Aly’s truthdrop supplemented questioning, the Berger couple provided the names of the Port Legann merchants conspiring against the Crown. These merchants along with the Berger couple were brought before the court in Port Legann to be tried for treason. 

“Treason is a crime against the Crown,” Lord Imrah announced in a tone grave as the tombstone gray robes he wore when the court had heard all the testimony against the merchants and listened to their defense. Inclining his head deferentially toward Roald in a gesture they had agreed upon before the trial had started, he went on, “Therefore, I leave the judgment and sentencing to the Crown Prince Roald.” 

“The law stipulates that the lives and properties of those convicted of treason are forfeit to the Crown.” Roald found it somehow easy to sound hard when his lips felt numb. Shinko had persuaded him that the sentence for treason must be harsh or it wasn’t justice and would invite further conspiring against royalty perceived as too weak to govern. “I judge all the defendants here assembled guilty of treason against the Crown. All their property is forfeit to the Crown, and they will be drawn and quartered in the public square at dawn three days hence.” 

An outbreak of disgusted gasps mingling with excited cheers echoed throughout the courtroom.. Drawing and quartering—a traditional punishment for commoners convicted of treason in this part of the realm—was as much public entertainment as it was grisly warning. 

To recapture the crowd’s attention, Roald gave a single, sharp pound on his gavel and waited for the ringing silence to follow before he continued, “The Crown is just, but it is also merciful even to repentant traitors. According to the testimony of Lady Alianne of Pirate’s Swoop”—Here, he glanced at Aly, dressed in sober black gown befitting the solemnity of the occasion, who offered a slight nod from the front row of the box reserved for the Crown’s witnesses—“the Berger couple was cooperative in questioning. In light of their cooperation, their sentence will be converted from drawing and quartering to hanging from the neck until dead. Their properties will also be forfeited to the Crown but held in trust for their only daughter Elaine, who shall be named ward of the Crown until such time as she comes of age.” 

The Berger couple—in a perverse twist of irony—looked as if they thad been spared the executioner’s ax at the final instant by the inexplicable intervention of a benevolent higher power. Roald barely noticed their relief, however, because Shinko, sitting beside him, squeezed his wrist tightly enough to bruise. 

He couldn’t risk the indignity of rubbing at this injury until they were ensconced in their carriage, rattling up the cobblestone roads to Legann castle with sentries encircling them on all sides for their protection from the masses who could range from the adoring to the hostile. 

“Did you have to squeeze my wrist so tightly, dear?” Roald couldn’t decide whether his tone was more sulky or scolding but knew neither was particularly princely. “My wrist resembles nothing more than an overripe grape.” 

“I apologize if I have done my lord husband injury.” Shinko lowered her head, and Roald had the impression she was concealing her lack of remorse for bruising him behind her black curtain of hair. “I was only shocked that you had named the Berger girl a ward of the Crown and given her the right to inherit her parents’ properties when she comes of age.” 

“I thought we’d discussed both points and were in agreement, darling.” It was Roald’s turn to drop his gaze to the swaying floor of the coach as if to avoid seeing the truth his words were obscuring. 

“We discussed both points but reached no agreement, and I believe you know that, husband.” Shinko rapped his unbruised wrist with her fan, and Roald might have been grateful for the kindness of sparing his bruised wrist if he didn’t suspect the wrist she had hit would soon be rivaling the other in swelling. “You made your decision without consulting me because you feared I would talk you out of it. You didn’t have enough faith in your judgment to believe it would withstand my questioning.” 

“I need your support right now, Shinko.” Roald massaged at the wrist she had attacked with her fan, voicing an appeal that would have been humiliating if it were directed to anyone except his beloved wife. He wondered how she couldn’t see his doubt, sympathize with it, and seek to vanish it with her soft, soothing murmurs that called to mind water flowing over pebbles. “Not your questioning my judgment.” 

“Very well.” Shinko’s eyes gentled even as her fan splayed in a gesture Roald knew meant warning, not surrender. “I’ll support rather than question your decision, but I would advise you that in the future I can better support your decisions when I’m consulted upon them in advance. It’s difficult to support one who makes unilateral decisions.” 

“I’m grateful for your support.” Roald bowed his head in acknowledgement of her grievance. “I promise to consult with you in the future before making such significant decisions. I’ll strive to act in union with you instead of unilaterally.” 

Shinko accepted this promise graciously, and though quiet filled the air between them for the remainder of the ride, Roald felt they were no longer at odds but reconciled. She had accepted his judgment, and he had recognized the need to consult with her in the future. There was no cause for tension between them. 

Upon their return to Legann castle, Roald took his leave from his wife with a polite bow he hoped emphasized his humility before her and went to the room where Elaine was being kept under guard on his orders. Entering the room when the posted sentries unlocked the door, he saw that plates of moldering food littered the table and the room’s occupant appeared pale and thin as a ghost. 

“Your Highness.” She fell to her knees before him, clutching at her neck as though fearing a noose might be tied about it. “Have mercy on my parents and me.” 

“I’ve shown your parents what mercy I can.” Gazing into her desperate, innocent eyes, Roald couldn’t bring himself to explain that this mercy merely extended to the means of her parents’ inevitable execution. Her parents had been guilty but somehow Roald felt he was as well for sentencing them according to the law. “I’ve done the same for you. You’ll be a ward of the Crow, and your parents’ properties will be held by the Crown in trust for you until you come of age.” 

The girl seemed bright enough that he would let her figure out why she would be ward of the Crown with her parents’ properties held in trust for her by the Crown without stating outright that her parents were to be executed. He was determined to hurt her as little as possible even though he must cause her great pain. She was, after all, an innocent victim of her parents’ treason. 

“How are they to be executed, Your Highness?” Elaine asked in a strangled voice. 

“They are to be hanged.” Roald had to resist the urge to cough out a choking feeling that was tightening his own throat. “I assure you the executioner knows his business, and their necks will snap in an instant. They won’t suffer at the end. You have my word on that.” 

“I thank you for your mercy.” Elaine spoke in barely more than whisper, and Roald marveled that she could feel any gratitude to the prince who had sentenced her parents to death. In her place, he was certain he would have hated himself. 

“You’ll serve my wife until you’re grown and the Crown arranges a suitable match for you.” Roald reached down to take the girl’s trembling hand and lift her to her feet because he couldn’t bear to gaze down at her kneeling in supplication any longer. “I’ll summon a maid to clean you so you’ll be presentable when you’re introduced to Her Highness.” 

“Thank you for believing I can become clean, Your Highness.” Elaine must have mastered her shaking fingers long enough to muster a wobbly curtsy. 

Roald’s eyes swept over her quaking frame, understanding that she was thanking him more for believing she could be clean of a treasonous taint than for a promised bath. “I trust you’ll reward my faith with your returned loyalty.” 

“Your faith and kindness have earned my eternal loyalty, Your Highness.” The girl sank into a second curtsy—this one slightly steadier than the last. 

As Roald strode out of the room with her oath of loyalty repeating in his ears, he wondered if he deserved it or any other pledge of allegiance when he felt so stiff and hollow like a corpse that had died but had yet to be respectably buried.


	6. Ward of the Crown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My apologies once again for the delay in posting. I blame it on my deciding to go on vacation. Hopefully the next (and final) chapter will be up more quickly...

Ward of the Crown

“May I present Elaine Berger?” As Roald presented Elaine to his wife in the Legann castle parlor that had been designated for their use throughout their visit, it occurred to him with a sinking sensation in his stomach that perhaps he should have consulted with Shinko before assigning the girl to her service. “She’s to serve you as a ward of the Crown.” 

“I welcome you to my service, Elaine.” Shinko’s impassive features didn’t project welcome, and the sinking sensation in Roald’s stomach seemed to hit rock bottom and begin to dig. Her dark gaze flickered to Lady Haname, standing silently as a sentry along the wall until summoned into service. “Lady Haname will take you into her charge and train you in your duties.” 

Lady Haname stepped forward, bowed to Shinko in the Yamani fashion with her palms pressed against her thighs, and guided Elaine from the parlor, Elaine apparently so starstruck at being in Shinko’s presence that she only remembered to sweep a curtsy a heartbeat before she trailed Lady Haname out of the room. 

“You want me to take the daughter of traitors into my service, Roald?” Shinko stared at him as if his wits had gone begging in the filthiest Port Legann slum. 

“I thought you of all people would understand the plight of a daughter of traitors.” Roald spoke more sharply than he had intended—transforming an observation into an accusation—because he was shocked she could be so stubbornly callous in describing Elain when she had spent so many of her formative years branded a daughter of traitors who could never be trusted or forgiven. “Given your history.” 

“I know my history quite well, having lived it myself.” Shinko’s voice was cold as ice cracking beneath Roald’s feet, and he wondered if she would ever forgive him for the pointed reminder of the shame her parents had inflicted on her family with their treason. After all, to the Yamani there was no insult more terrible than a loss of face brought on by family shame. “You needn’t remind me of it, thank you, husband.” 

“I trust you’ll treat the girl kindly.” Roald didn’t want Shinko transferring her anger at him onto the girl he had placed in her care. It would be most unjust. 

“I treat all in my service kindly.” Shinko’s tone remained dangerously cool—cool enough to freeze an ocean. 

“If you don’t think you can”—Roald fixed his blue gaze on hers, offering her an escape route he half-hoped she would take—“I’ll entrust her to my mother instead.” 

“I’ll continue to manage my own household if it pleases you, husband.” Shinko seemed to regard what he had intended as a courtesy as further affront for he could see her shoulders stiffening beneath her soft silks. 

“Nothing would please me more.” Roald ached to kiss his wife on the cheek but feared it would make her stiffen further instead of relent her to his charms. Spine straight, he retreated from the room with all the dignity he could muster, bidding her a formal farewell in a tone almost as icy as hers. 

As he so often had at Legann, he sought comfort on the castle ramparts overlooking the surging ocean. Any lingering wrath he felt toward Shinko would be drowned in the ceaseless sound of the waves crashing against the craggy coast. Any tears that rose in his eyes could be dried by the salty wind that kissed his face like an eternally seductive, forgiving lover. That was what he had imagined when he took refuge on the ramparts at any rate, but Lord Imrah strode up beside him, interrupting his reverie before he could translate this vision into reality. 

Lord Imrah’s face reminded Roald of a boulder slowly and inexorably being consumed by the forever frothing waves of the Emerald Ocean as he asked, “What troubles you, Your Highness?”

“How do you know anything troubles me, my lord?” Roald frowned. He had always prided himself on his inscrutability—his calm reserve— and he was uncertain whether he was in the mood for sharing confidences with anyone, even his former knightmaster. 

“You have a knot in your forehead the size of a walnut.” Lord Imrah indicated a furrow in Roald’s forehead that Roald became abruptly and awkwardly aware of at that instant. It was a traitor expression, he decided, betraying his inner turmoil when he most wished to seem serene. “It always appears when you’re troubled.” 

“Do you ever wonder why we should love someone with all our hearts”—Roald clenched his hands on the stone ramparts as he thought of Shinko and let the question tumble from his mouth like a rock falling to the ocean floor before he lost his courage—“for all the right reasons when in a moment that person can choose to remain angry at us forever for no just cause?” 

“We continue to love them with all our hearts even if they they choose to be angry at us forever on unfair grounds because that is chivalry and our duty.” Lord Imrah squeezed Roald’s shoulder, stern and compassionate as he had been ever since Roald was his squire. “If it’s any consolation to you, however, I believe Princess Shinkokami loves you too much to remain angry at you forever no matter what you’ve done or not done.” 

“That’s all the consolation I’ll ever need,” Roald said, because it was the simple truth that seared him to the bone.


	7. The Hope of Reconciliation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is finally finished. Thank you to all who had the patience to see it through to the end!

Hope of Reconciliation 

“Look, Da!” Lianokami exclaimed to Roald, removing her small hand from his so she could point a finger at a distant surge of white wave spouting from a rugged outcropping along the coast. “It looks like water spouting from a whale’s blowhole.” 

Roald chuckled, wondering how his daughter had settled on this simile when she had never seen a whale before. “It’s the Wave Walker’s Well, my dear. Water surges into a hole in the rocks with each wave, is churned about in an underwater cavern, and then spouts out like a fountain. It’s particularly spectacular—and dangerous—at high tide.” 

He placed extra emphasis on the word “dangerous,” which she disregarded, declaring, “I want to go there now, Da.” 

Roald’s vision clouded with a thousand images of his unwary daughter being swept screaming into the churning cavern, dying from her skull smashing against soaked stone. Before he could forbid her from embarking on any such rash exploration, Elaine, who had been trailing behind him, Shinko, and Liankokami as they strolled along the beach stepped forward, grabbing Lianokami’s wrists to capture her attention as she asked, “Do you want to walk to the water, Your Highness?” 

“Yes!” Lianokami shouted, desires shifting faster than sand swallowed by the onrushing ocean. As she and Elaine stood at the edge of the shore and waves rose to dance around their ankles, she gasped in awe. “I feel as if I’m moving even though I’m standing still and my feet are covered with more and more sand with every wave.” 

“She’s good with Lianokami,” Shinko commented to Roald as they continued their walk along the beach, trusting Elaine to keep Lianokami safe from drowning. “It’s a pleasure to have her in my service.” 

“I’m glad you’re happy.” Roald gave a small smile, tentative with the hope of reconciliation. Since Elaine had entered his wife’s service, Shinko had been as cold to him—sleeping on the far side of their shared bed—as she had to Elaine. This was the first flicker of warmth she had showed to him or Elaine since Elaine had been assigned to her service. 

“Will forgive me for how I reacted to Elaine entering my service?” Shinko stopped suddenly to stare into his face. 

“Of course.” Roald reached out to draw her into a gentle embrace against his chest, wondering if she could hear his heart pounding like the ocean inside him. “I’d be happy to be reconciled with you, darling.” 

“Will you lie with me again, husband?” Shinko’s cheek pressed against his shoulder. 

“Always if you wish it.” Roald’s voice sounded rougher than he had intended, and his fingers felt clumsy combing through her hair. “Never if you don’t. I’d never force myself upon you.” 

“I want it.” Shinko’s murmur was so soft Roald almost didn’t hear it over the waves breaking behind them. “I thought you were punishing me by denying me it as men discipline intractable wives who don’t respond to beatings in the Yamani Islands.There is no greater shame for a wife than for her husband to deny her.” 

“I’d never punish or shame you, my love.” Roald unleashed a trail of kisses along her hair—so hot from the sun it almost burned his lips. “I thought you were punishing me. In Tortall, it’s wives, not husbands, who punish their spouses in that manner.” 

“I’d never presume to punish my husband.” Shinko’s hand slipped up to cup his chin as her gaze sparkled at him like the sunshine on the waves. “In the Yamani Islands, there are glassmakers who make glass so fine and fragile that even the emperor covets it, but their greatest craft is in recreation—in making glass that had been broken whole again. These works are their most priceless because in remaking what was lost, a new value—a new beauty was created.” 

“That can happen to any relationship after an apology.” Roald guided her fingers to his lips for his kiss, grinning as he understood the deeper meaning behind her words. “That’s the hope of reconciliation.”


End file.
